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TV presenter suspended after mocking India’s CM’s name

WARNING: The editorial below contains crude references. It may not be appropriate for younger readers.

A New Zealand television station has suspended its breakfast show host Paul Henry for mispronouncing Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s name several times in a crude manner.

Henry’s slurs featured as a clip on TVNZ website in which he ridicules the name of Commonwealth Games troubleshooter Sheila Dikshit.

The Video Extras section of TVNZ’s website promoted the Dikshit clip, which now appears to have been removed, under the heading “Paul Henry laughs about the name Dikshit”, Stuff.co.nz reports.

“The dip shit woman. God, what’s her name? Dick Shit. Is it Dick Shit … it looks like ‘Dick Shit’. It’s so appropriate, because she’s Indian, so she’d be dick-in-shit wouldn’t she, do you know what I mean? Walking along the street… it’s just so funny,” Henry said.

TVNZ has received at least four complaints about the clip, in which Henry deliberately mispronounces Dikshit, despite being told.

Meanwhile, perturbed Hindus are asking for immediate termination of Henry’s contract and charging him with racism and xenophobia.

Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA), said that reported making repeated fun of Sheila Dikshit’s last name was plain bigotry and was not acceptable. There was nothing to be laughed at “Dikshit” as it was a well-meaning word in Hinduism, which simply meant “initiated”.